Wood on Words: Apostrophes cause constant confusion

A recent editorial cartoon about the death of pop singer Davy Jones of the Monkees contained this pretend newspaper headline: “Monkee’s Davy Jones dies.”

Barry Wood

A recent editorial cartoon about the death of pop singer Davy Jones of the Monkees contained this pretend newspaper headline:

“Monkee’s Davy Jones dies.”

It’s another example of the trouble caused by the apostrophe, the mark that puts the punk in punctuation.

The name of the group, Monkees, is plural — there were four members. Each one was a Monkee, singular. So the headline could have said “Monkee Davy Jones” or “Monkees’ Davy Jones,” but “Monkee’s” just doesn’t work there.

I delved into this topic a bit in my recent column on Presidents (President’s, Presidents’) Day, but the apostrophe is worth multiple columns. As it happens, three more holidays with apostrophes are on the horizon: April Fools’ Day (more than one fool), and Mother’s Day and Father’s Day (one biological mom and dad per customer).

For most cases, where to place an apostrophe is determined solely by whether the word is singular or plural, and this applies to proper nouns (names) and common nouns.

For example, let’s consider the Marx brothers, another group from a different era also known for comedy and music. There were five of them — stage names Groucho, Harpo, Chico, Zeppo and Gummo — although they usually appeared four at a time or, later, three.

Each brother was a Marx. The five of them were Marxes. So a singular possessive would be something like “Groucho Marx’s mustache” (apostrophe before the “s”), but a plural would be “the Marxes’ movies” (“s” before the apostrophe).

You first have to determine whether the word that needs an apostrophe is singular or plural before you can put it in the right spot. Notice that the word to the left of an apostrophe is unchanged, whether singular or plural.

A common apostrophe error with names, and one with high visibility, involves signs designating where people live. For example, Harpo Marx’s wife’s name was Susan. There are several ways to refer to their home: “the Harpo and Susan Marx home,” “the Marx home,” “Harpo and Susan Marx’s home,” “the Marxes’ home.”

But the one option that doesn’t work is “the Marx’s home” — or simply “the Marx’s.”

By the way, most plurals are commonly formed just by adding an “s.” But I chose to use the Marxes (adding “es”) because they’re more fun.

But the idea is the same: no “the Brown’s,” “the Wood’s” or “the Smith’s” — although that last one could be referring to a blacksmith’s shop, I suppose.

Another example of this type, and one that has caught the eye of readers of this newspaper, unfortunately, is in social announcements. “George and Martha Washington’s 35th wedding anniversary” is correct, and so is “the Washingtons’ 35th wedding anniversary,” but “the Washington’s ...” is not. That last one is singular possessive, but the reference is to two Washingtons. And that calls for plural.

Here are three other types of what “The Chicago Manual of Style” calls “particularities of the possessive”:

Two nouns as a unit: Let’s take as an example a married couple, John and Marsha. To refer to their children, it would be “John and Marsha’s children.” But for their children’s grandparents, it would be “John’s and Marsha’s parents,” because each has a different mother and father. Interestingly, if this was their second marriage and each had children from the previous one, it could be “John’s and Marsha’s children.”

Genitive: The Chicago stylebook says, “Analogous to possessives, and formed like them, are certain expressions based on the old genitive case. The genitive here implies ‘of.’” Examples include “an hour’s wages,” “three days’ leave of absence” and “four weeks’ vacation.”

Possessive with “of”: Contrary to a somewhat popular notion, the word “of” and the possessive can be used together where, as the Chicago book puts it, “‘one of several’ is implied.” An example would be “a friend of Bob’s.” The possessive seems more natural when a pronoun is used: “a friend of his,” not a “friend of he.”

Next time I’ll look at an even more challenging apostrophe issue: the possessive case vs. attributive forms.